Cell 502
by Division 502
Summary: Welcome to Relictus, Menagerie. Remnant's Alcatraz, home to the worst of the worst or those the world would rather forget exists so they can deny that even humans can be as dark as the creatures they fight. Join the RWBY cast as they all wind up on this hellish island and have to learn that at the end of the day it is survival of the fittest. None will be spared the dark inside...
1. Chapter 1

"Cell 502 ready to drop. Good riddance you lot." Jaune was snapped out of his thoughts as the floor beneath him dropped away and he fell towards the ground.

"Well crap", he muttered as the hurtled towards the dirt below. He landed flat on his front and felt a bump forming on his forehead. As Jaune started to lift himself off the ground something heavy landed on his back, causing his head to hit the ground again as well as injuring his back. He looked up and saw that it was not a something that had landed on him, but a someone.

"Uhhh…. You wanna... get off of me?" Jaune coughed. A white haired girl with a scar running down her left eye looked at him venomously as she picked herself up and headed towards a smaller female fox faunus lying prone under a tree. Jaune got to his feet, dusted himself off and took note of the surrounding area. He was in what looked like a kind of courtyard in between four dull concrete two story houses. The houses were small and seemed to be falling apart in front of Jaune's eyes. There were small holes on the sides of the house where he could see straight into the building itself.

The girl that had landed on top of him was checking on the girl she had walked towards after she had gotten off of him. His eyes wandered over to a girl with a long blonde mane that cascaded down her back. She was sitting against a wall arms crossed, clearly pissed off about something. Standing off in the distance was another girl wearing a black bow, her amber eyes looking around warily.

"Well this beats one of Ironwood's cells." an older man with orange hair that draped the right side of his face, covering his right eye. The eye that was visible was a shade of dark green.

"I bet you would know all about that." said a boy with silver hair and grey eyes. He had a smug look on his face that Jaune would love nothing more than to just punch right off. But alas, the shortcomings of being a weekling.

A girl behind them with mint green hair and dark red eyes sighed and shook her head at the two. "Can you two please give me a break?"

A raven haired boy with pink eyes and a similar colored streak in his hair was crouching beside an orange haired girl who was looking around with panicked eyes and seemed to be on the verge of tears. The boy seemed to be looking around just like Jaune. The two's eyes met and Jaune quickly looked away.

Jaune looked to his left and saw a girl leaning against one of the buildings a few yards away. She had long red hair and looked like she wasn't to aware of her surroundings. Her green eyes were glazed over and she was just staring at the ground with her arms crossed.

As Jaune started to stand up, he heard someone silently sobbing behind him. He turned around and saw a rabbit faunus in the fetal position As she continued to cry, three people came towards her and started to try and comfort her. The first one, a girl, had brunette hair with blonde tips while the other two were both boys, one towering over the rest with black buzz cut hair while the other was slightly shorter with dark skin and copper hair.

Jaune fully stood up and waited for the lightheadedness to stop as all the blood rushed out of his head. He stumbled over to one of the buildings and leaned up against a pole so he could regain his balance. He put his full weight against it and it shifted backwards, throwing him off balance again and making him fall flat on his back. The pole shifted a loose slab of concrete on the side of the building causing it to tip forward and fall forwards towards Jaune who was still sprawled on the ground.

Jaune barely had time to scream before two pairs of hands grabbed his legs and pulled him out of the path of the falling piece of wall. The two people who had just saved him had escaped his notice before when he was looking around. The first was a male faunus with black hair, green eyes, and a monkey tail while the second was another male faunus who suspiciously also had very similar black hair and green eyes, but white tiger ears and a similar colored tail.

"Well at least you used the right one this time", the tiger faunus said, directing this remark towards the monkey faunus.

"It was a mistake that anyone who was just starting out would make", the monkey faunus replied with a shrug of his shoulders and an amused grin on his face.

"Yah yah, whatever", the tiger faunus said before directing his attention towards Jaune. "You are pretty damn lucky that we were able to make it to you before that hunk of stone crushed you, next time don't be such an idiot and watch where you're going"

The monkey faunus frowned and looked towards his companion. "What crawled down your pants and bit you?"

"I don't know if you have noticed by now but we are in the middle of nowhere with no food or water and probably surrounded by grimm who are just waiting to rip our sorry little heads off. If I die here I'm totally coming back to haunt your ass!"

"I'm sorry to interrupt but, who the hell are you two?" Jaune asked, bewildered.

"Sorry for be so impolite for you see, I DON'T GIVE TWO SHITS" the monkey faunus said focusing back on Jaune. "Let me introduce myself so that I may be the proper gentleman that apparently others make me out to be. My name is Nachton and my 'friend' here is Rezeal. We used to be hunters until I killed a man, which is apparently illegal, and he tried to kill me for killing that man."

"That guy was my boss!" Rezeal yelled

"He had it coming"

"He sneezed on you!"

"Your point?"

"My point is you don't kill people for sneezing!"

"Regardless of the specifics, I'm here and so are you so we're going to have to deal with it"

Jaune stood up and started to back away from the two. "Well, it was an experience meeting you two psychopaths but I have things to do that are less threatening to my life than hanging out with you both."

Nach smirked and waved saying, "Ok, it was nice meeting you."

"And for the record," Rezal looked towards Jaune with a ear to ear smile "I'm a sociopath not a psychopath."

Jaune quickly walked away and exited the courtyard. Outside the square of houses was a gray looking landscape to what he presumed was the south were a range of hills. To his left were more buildings that looked more or less like the ones he had landed in between.

From behind him he heard someone call for everyone's attention.

The girl with the blonde hair was standing in the center of the courtyard, "Hey you lot, my friend and I have decided to go over to the hills and see what we can see. Those of you who want to see what we're dealing with here feel free to follow us. Those of you who are too pussy and want to stay behind to watch the vegetables, go right ahead. We leave in 10 minutes so be ready."

She then went back to the people she had been talking to earlier.

* * *

"Just a few more yards 'till we reach the top" said the brown haired girl. She had earlier introduced herself as Coco Adel, a former huntress in training at beacon. Jaune had heard of her and her team but he had never really seen them before.

A group of 5 people, including himself, sat in a circle, taking a break. They had been walking for about an hour and had started to go uphill about fifteen minutes ago making the trek even more difficult. The group consisted of the giant whose name was Yatsuhashi Daichi who was also part of Coco's team back at beacon, the orange haired man who told them his name was Roman Torchwick, and the silver haired boy who went by the name of Mercury Black.

Jaune had heard of Roman as he had been a notorious criminal before he was captured and even now when he no longer had his weapon, Melodic Cudgel, he was still very intimidating.

Suddenly Coco stood up and clapped her hands together. "Ok, let's get going. I'd say it's about another 5 minutes to the top so it shouldn't be too hard."

They started their ascent towards the top of the hill. So far the group hadn't come across any grimm which was slightly suspicious to Jaune. He wasn't complaining about it but they surely should have met at least a little resistance by now.

Finally they reached the top of the hill. Jaune collapsed onto the ground, exhausted from the last stretch of climbing. He had never been very fit while at beacon so this was not fun in the slightest for him.

The others went past him and looked out on where they had landed.

"Oh shit," he heard Coco mutter.

"What the fuck is this?" Mercury said.

Jaune stood up the best he could without retching and looked at what the others were seeing. All around them were walls that could easily exceed half a kilometer. Inside the walls were countless amounts of buildings just like the ones Jaune had seen earlier.

And from the looks of it, they weren't the only people here. There were signs that others lived in the rundown buildings surrounding theirs.

The thing that everyone was so startled about was the fact that none of the walls seemed to have doors of any kind. In short, they were trapped.

* * *

 **Snot: Well then, this was the first real chapter of cell that has long been awaited by those of you who actually like our story. Sorry for such a long wait for the first chapter, we thought it necessary to introduce most of the main group who this story will be centered around before having the actual story start. I'm also sorry for how short the chapter is but just remember, Dantai the hobbit can always make it shorter**

 **Dantai: Hey my shit isn't that short. This chapter is about the size of my normal chapters.**

 **Sauron: *shouts from the distance* It's kinda short mate.**

 **Dantai: I'm standing right next to you just because my head is at your knee doesn't mean you have to shout.**

 **Snot: It kinda does.**

 **Dantai: Fuck off.**

 **Snot: ANYWAYS, I hope you all join us in the next chapter for this insanity that is Cell. See ya'll later.**

 **Note From the Editor: Umm, why was that so tame? Oh right, I know why...**


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2: Painful Edges

'Crap, no semblance!' Ruby mentally screams as she falls from her spot on Weiss' lap into a total freefall. Wind whips the fox's hair around, and subconsciously Ruby moves her tail into a position blocked from the forceful winds. Angling towards a tree, she crosses her arms in front of her face and slam her eyes closed, the branches ripping at her jumpsuit. With an audible "oof" of pain she slams into the hard dirt and roots around the trunk.

"Ruby!" The voice of her favorite heiress gets her to roll over and look around until meeting a running Weiss' worried eyes. Her pretty white locks are frazzled and unkempt just from the one fall. She drops to her knees and skids up to Ruby, checking her for wounds.

"Weiss, I'm fine. Just help me up." That seemed to have an effect on the heiress, who stands and holds out her hand to pull her girlfriend up. Not even a second afterwards Weiss envelops the girl in a hug Ruby is much too happy to reciprocate.

"Don't do that again! You had me worried…" were the words Ruby felt more than heard from Weiss' position against her neck. The faunus senses a need to calm her girlfriend and pushes her from the hug. Seeing the slightly dejected expression her head bobs forwards with a minor smirk, capturing the heiress' lips in a kiss.

Breaking the kiss, Ruby uses her thumb to dash away a stray tear from Weiss' cheek. She takes a moment to inwardly chuckle at the role reversal. Usually Weiss is the one to cheer her up like this. "I should've been the one worried. I saw you break off towards the open field away from the trees. How'd you land anyways?"

That didn't have the intended effect. Weiss cracked her own cheeky grin and said, "I landed on some blonde kid's back, it was shockingly flabby."

Ruby's ear twitches at the sound of a far off bird screech. Her head snaps upward and looks around. "Weiss, I think I just heard a Nevermore? We need to go further into the forest." The heiress just nods and follows Ruby deep into the forest, not even feeling the need to question her girlfriend.

Little to their knowledge, someone else had been watching, following in curiosity, and disgusted at the thought of the Schnee heiress being with a faunus.

Ruby kept both pairs of ears to the sky while simultaneously on the underbrush around them. 'For a prison island, you'd think we would have dealt with a Grimm den by now?'

The earlier shriek never seemed to return to her relief but a sense of being watched seemed to permeate the air ever since the tree cover blocked out the sun with their overgrown size. Ruby began hearing a while back the sounds of heavy footsteps akin to a rather bulky human, their size to large to regularly remain stealthy, especially against a Faunus. 'Do I tell Weiss? We have so much to worry about already. I'd rather not, but…'

A soft wind blows from behind, gentle enough to be ignored but strong enough to carry the scent of an unbathed male. "Someone needs to bathe."

The heiress' head seemed to jump at Ruby's mumbled words, the noise having broken her deteriorating mind. "What was that?"

"I think somebody, you'd refer to as a 'brute,' is following us. We can either give him the slip-" as Ruby talked, a tall, well built boy with cropped brown hair jumped from the bushes, having given up on hiding once he heard his cover get blown.

"Fucking animal trash! Go die like the rest of your inhuman kind!"

"Excuse me?! That's my-" was all Weiss got out in retaliation before the brown haired brute interrupted.

"And you! What the hell is a Schnee doing dating a Faunus? And a female at that? I thought Schnees were the normal ones, not dating freaks or being freaks themselves!" He opened his mouth to continue, but Weiss landed a solid kick to his loins to take advantage of his slowly advancing walk. He staggered back a bit, before growling out, "Bitch, you're gonna pay for that!" The brute rushed her then and reached out and wrapped his hand around Weiss' neck, slamming her violently against the nearest tree.

Ruby visibly began panicking at the sight of her girlfriend struggling to breathe. The fox's eyes darted back and forth, up and down looking for something to help the situation, a stick wouldn't even get his attention, she needed anything better than her bare fists. Looking up, she noticed the sunlight bounce off a shiny red box in the tree branches, and without so much of a second thought jumped onto the brute's shoulder to try and get enough height to knock the box down. Successfully hitting it, she crashed back to the ground, the box flying off to hit the brute's hard head without so much as a flinch, clearly too absolved in removing the world of a 'freak.'

As it collided with the attacker, it flew open spilling what looked like a survival kit out around them all. Among the mess, Ruby sees a small blade, probably meant as a steak knife or something as it's not the most proper improv weapon but better than she could've hoped for. Rushing forward to grab the knife before anyone else notices, she carries through using all her weight to plunge the blade into his arm, but so engrossed in his torture, his grip doesn't slacken enough.

Seeing Weiss's eyes start to flutter, threatening to close, something inside Ruby snaps, and she drives the blade into his shoulder again, a howl piercing the sky as she savagely starts trying to sever the limb from his body to let Weiss go.. His grip falters and Weiss drops to the floor gasping for air.

The fox continues stabbing, no longer registering what's happening, her heart crying to protect Weiss, she pushes the man back against the very tree he had held her girlfriend nearly unconscious against. Stabbing she continued, stabbing over and over again. Ruby was crying, repeating something she barely recognized as speech at the top of her lungs. Stabbing until every single thought in her head came to the rhythm of the knife impaling flesh. Don't touch Weiss. Don't touch Weiss. Don't. Touch. Weiss!

Finally she stops, pulling the knife out and letting the body hit the floor, not even registering the amount of blood coating herself, the knife, or the tree.

In. Out. In. Out. Weiss repeated those simple two words to herself as she tried regaining her breath. Slowly sound started coming back to her. Then feeling. Then sight.

Steadily, a voice grew in volume saying, then yelling, "Don't touch Weiss," along with some nondescript squishing sound. She recognized the voice as Ruby's.

With sight finally regained, the heiress looks up just in time to watch Ruby pull a steak knife from that brute's stomach, and Ruby's wailing come to a quick decrescendo, barely able to be called muttering. Weiss watches as tears fall from her eyes and the body of that once living man drops like a sack of potatoes. Ruby then seems to register what just happened, staring at the blade in horror like some evil device that could kill millions. It drops from the girl's hand, and both can only stare at the blood running down her sleeves.

"R-Ruby?" Weiss says calmly, but even that was enough to startle the poor girl.

"Wei-eiss stay b-back!"

This only encourages the heiress to slowly walk forward more. "Ruby it's okay."

The faunus girl's ears and tail droop, and she looks towards the ground and to the side, "I don't want to hurt you…" She weakly says in quiet protest. Weiss takes this moment to rush forward and wrap her girl in a hug, waiting for the inevitable torrent of tears to let loose. It was her first kill, after all.

And flood the tears do. Ruby returns Weiss' gentle hug with a tighter more fierce one of her own desperately clinging to her reason to live and why she had to do it, why she had to keep going. To keep Weiss alive. For quite some time they stand like that, before Ruby finally calms down, the heiress continuing her comforting hold and whispering soothing words into Ruby's less sensitive set of ears.

"Weiss… I… I didn't even know his name." Ruby finally says, startling Weiss that she could even find it in her to speak up after that. She hesitates before responding.

"I think I saw his name on his jumpsuit before I was… choked. It said 'C. Winchester.' Why?"

"He may have been a bad guy, but mom taught me to never fight in vain, and to never kill without 'damn good' reason. He was my first… kill… I want to remember his name." All the heiress can do is mull over her reasoning, ultimately accepting it and making it her own goal to strive to do the same. To cling to that shard of good buried in this dark hellhole.

Not even subtly, Weiss changes the subject. "You wanna head away from here?" Ruby nodded against Weiss' collar. "Let's grab the knife and go."

Knife back in Ruby's hands, they emerge from the forest back into their Cell. Ruby's blood caked jumpsuit, skin, and hair deterring everyone away, not to mention the bloody knife dangling at her side. The duo sits against the nearest cabin wall, Weiss still straight up and Ruby laying in her lap.

When one is presented with such a situation, one can only stare in disbelief at the oddity. The Schnee daughter cuddling with a faunus covered in blood, backs against the wall of one of the… ahem, houses of this merry lot's cell in the twilight.

A cat faunus' ear twitched in minor annoyance as she tried to make heads or tails of the image before her. Having seen the damage the Schnee family had done to Faunus everywhere, her mind was convinced that what lay before her was an illusion, but her eyes and heart could tell how comfortable the pair was with each other, both clinging to each other with desperation and true love in their eyes.

That Schnee has to be faking it, right? Then why does she look so comfortable in the arms of a blood covered faunus girl?

A low grounding sounds out, surrounding Blake with its intensity. After recovering from the sudden noise, she looks up to watch the walls close. Browns and Reds shine from the cracks as its Dust mechanisms fill it in to prevent movement between cells, leaving her with an odd feeling of being completely trapped.

Trapped in a box of certain insanity.

Howls and growling can be heard just outside of her hearing, the Grimm sounding out from just beyond the walls.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3: Introductions**

Pain, grief, and anger. These were the only thoughts that went through Pyrrha's dreams the night after she arrived at Relictus. It had all happened so quickly, finding her mother pinned to the wall with her weapon, being questioned and accused of murder and treason, her father denying he was related to her in any way, and being sentenced to this hell hole. It was too much for her to handle, so she just shut down, not responding to anyone or anything around her.

The others in the Cell gave her strange looks while she just sat there lost in her own thoughts. After the importu scout party had left, the guy with the pink streak in his hair came over to her and suggested that she head into one of the building for the night. He offered for her to come with him and his friend into the one they had chosen. It was easily the most sturdy looking of the four buildings and seemed to have the most protection from the wind. She had accepted and soon after she properly met Lie Ren and Nora Valkyrie. She found Nora's constant energy slightly humorous and found it a nice distraction from her negative feelings. Who knows what's actually going on in the girl's head.

She had woken up the next morning after a fitful night's sleep and felt just as shitty today as she had yesterday, if not, more so. She slowly stood from where she had been laying on the floor and looked around. Ren and Nora were nowhere to be found, probably already up and about. She did see that one other person was in the room with her. The girl looked to be tall with long blond hair and fair skin. She was sprawled out on the floor with her limbs splayed out in several awkward positions that did not look comfortable at all.

Her attention was directed to outside when she heard something fall and a string of curses that should never be heard nor read by anyone online or otherwise. She walked over to the door and poked her head out to see some guy holding his knee with a pained expression on his face. He was wearing a pair of worn wool trousers along with a matching shirt and what looked like some poorly made wooden sandals that were held together by a coil of wires.

The guy looked up from where he was cradling his knee and saw Pyrrha staring at him. He blushed in embarrassment and stood, wincing as he put pressure on his knee that he had fallen on. He waved Pyrrha over, most likely wanting to meet her. Pyrrha sized him up and was not impressed by what he saw. He looked like he had seen his fair share of fights and might be semi useful in one. She thought back trying to remember if she had seen him on the bullhead along with all the others who had landed here. He didn't look familiar at all so she guessed he was from another one of the many buildings that were surrounding them.

She finally deemed him safe to approach walked up to him. Up close he looked very thin, as if he hadn't eaten at all for days. hair was dirty and matted with dirt caking his scalp. He looked extremely tired but still managed to stand without many problems.

"Hey there," he said with a grin that showed off his not so pearly whites, "I'm Neptune Vasilias. I came from Cell 492 which is a little ways off that way" He pointed off towards the east where the sun was rising.

"I'm Pyrrha" Pyrrha said, not really wanting to talk to him. She only responded because her mother had always told her to be polite to strangers no matter what the situation. ' _Of course, mom can't tell me that any more-'_ She stopped that thought before it could go anywhere looked back at Neptune who had started talking again.

"Well hi there Pyrrha. I came over here to give you and your fellow cell mates a tour of our lovely island community" he said in an obviously forced, cheerful voice.

"Um… I'm not really sure anyone else is here. Plus I'm not really feeling up to doing anything right now" Pyrrha said, rubbing her arm shyly.

"Oh come on, it'll help you fit in around her" Neptune said, flashing her his grin again.

"Hey creep! She said she didn't want to go with you so leave her alone"

Pyrrha and Neptune looked towards where the shout had come from to see a girl with long white hair stalking towards them with a stern look on her face. Pyrrha was convinced that this was Weiss Schnee from what she had heard about the girl. It couldn't have been her though since Pyrrha couldn't imagine what the heiress had done to get sent to a place like this.

"Whoa there princess. I wasn't doing anything bad, just offering to give you and your friends a tour of the island" Neptune said, putting his hands up in defense.

"Don't worry, it's fine. It would help for me to know more about the prison" Pyrrha said, looking at the possible heiress.

"If you say so. I'm going with you though, to make sure he doesn't try anything" Weiss said, pointing at Neptune with accusation plastered all over her face. "Weiss Schnee, by the way"

"Pleasure. I'm Pyrrha Nikos" This was met by a surprised look from both Weiss and Neptune.

"Well, it looks like I've been graced by the presence of two celebrities. It truly is an honor to meet both of you" Neptune gave a little bow after saying this. "Just so we can all be properly introduced, my name is Neptune Vasilias"

"Well Neptune, let's get this tour started" Weiss said, her arms crossed and a look of impatience set upon it.

"Fine, let's head out. We have a lot to cover so we'll be out most of the day" Neptune said, starting off to the north.

The two girls looked at each other and followed him towards the other buildings near theirs.

"Ok, first things first. Every square of buildings are referred to as a cell and each one has a number found on a plaque on the outside of one of the buildings. Yours is number 502 so people will call the whole lot of you cell 502 for their own convenience since they can't remember all of your names. Next, everyday after sundown, walls around your cells will go up to protect you from the grimm that flood this place at night. So I would recommend not being outside your cell at night" As he said this, Neptune gestured towards the nearest cell where Pyrrha could see a line in the stone surrounding the buildings.

"Now there is a small problem with food and water. There is a stream near the middle of the prison that has fresh water in it. That being said, there are also these weird black flecks in there. No one is quite sure what it is but so far no one has had any problems with it so we just ignore it. Also, you might have noticed by now that semblances don't work in here so don't bother trying" To test what he said, Pyrrha reached out with her polarity and didn't feel the pull she usually did when using it. "Food is also hard to get since not much can grow here. What we did manage to plant and harvest grows rather slowly so when we get food we make sure to store as much as we can that won't end up starving us."

"Another thing, most of the prison is split into groups or gangs that control an area of cells. I would suggest joining one of these gangs to protect yourself from attacks. All the gangs have leaders obviously. Anyways, you will want to make some kind of weapon so you can protect yourself in the chance that you are attacked by other prisoners or grimm that manage to get past your barricade. That's about it, any questions?" Neptune finished, clapping his hands and looking at the two with a questioning look.

"Ya," Weiss said, "Where are we?"

"Oh, um…" Neptune said. He looked around and his face got slightly pale. "So funny thing, I'm not too sure" They had walked quite a ways and were in an area where the cells were closer together than where they were located.

Weiss face palmed and Pyrrha got a bit nervous. She really didn't like the look of this part of the prison. It looked sketchy to say the least. Of course saying that about a prison was kinda pointless since the entire place was sketchy.

"Ok, I can get us back. I just need to find the right cell number and we should be fine" Neptune said, starting to look around at the cells around them. "Don't worry, I'll have us back in no time" He said with a confident smile.

* * *

3 Hours later…

"Fuck you, your family, your friends, and your hair, you lying piece of shit!" Weiss yelled as their Cell came back into view. They had gotten lost and doubled back more times than Pyrrha bothered to count.

As they approached, someone rushed out of one of the buildings and tackled the heiress while yelling what sounded unintelligible nonsense with how fast she was blabbering.

Eventually Weiss was able to get the girl off her and comfort her to the point where she was simply sniffling occasionally.

"Well thank you for giving us the tour Neptune, but I don't think we'll need another one anytime soon" Pyrrha said as she looked to the blue haired menace as she had now opted to calling him.

"Ya.. Um… No problem. I'll leave now. Bye girls." With this, Neptune turned on his heel and started walking down the rows of cells that surrounded them.

Pyrrha looked over to Weiss and the other girl. They were both holding each other, with Weiss comforting the other girl again.

Pyrrha decided to walk to the house that she had slept in last night and collapse. It had been tiring trying to find her way back and she was glad that it was over. Of course, the nightmares found their way back to her as well.

* * *

 **Snot: Hey there guys. I'm sorry this went out much later than it should have. I have no better excuse than that I was being a lazy piece of shit and put off doing it for a long time. I am working on fixing my procrastination habit so I'm hoping this won't happen again.**

 **Also, I am sorry that again this is a shorter chapter than you may be used to. This is just the way I write I guess. As always any and all reviews are accepted. It really helps us build the story on what you guys think could be better.**

 **I also don't believe that we ever thanked our inspiration to form this group and make this story on this account. Thank you so much to Legion 205 for making the all amazing stories they do. They inspired us to come together as a group so I really do suggest that you guys go check any and all of them out.**

 **Secret: I also noticed that while not wanting to write an AN, I never claimed chapter 2.**


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4: Merciful Silence**

It had been a week since the residents of Cell 502 had been dropped into Relictus. Despite the emotional difficulties, the group had done a good job of getting used to their new life. Every night large walls surrounding the cell would go up, effectively isolating them from the other cells, and every morning those walls would come down, allowing them to go throughout their day to day activities. On this particular night Ruby and Weiss were having a short conversation about their day. This was a small habit they had formed to help them cope with the stress of being in Relictus. When they were about to finish the conversation and go to bed Ruby looked out the pitiful excuse for a window and realized something.

"Hey Weiss," the fox faunus said cautiously. "Why didn't the walls go up?"

"What do you mean?" Weiss questioned while moving to be beside her girlfriend. When she got there she looked out the window and realized that Ruby was right. There were no large grey walls blocking their view. The former heiress' mind raced as she tried to make sense of the situation. However as she failed to do so she turned and walked toward the door of the room she shared with Ruby. "I have no idea what's going on, but I don't think it's good. Let's go tell the others and make sure everyone's awake and prepared for anything."

Weiss had barely finished her statement when the silver-eyed faunus raced past her to inform the others. A hastily spoken, "I'll wake Velvet's house and Roman's house, you wake everyone else," reached her ears as the faster of the two girls raced by. Shaking her head Weiss started waking those that she had been assigned to. As people were woken and informed of the situation they started walking outside to ensure that all the walls had stayed down for the night rather than just one or two. This resulted in the entirety of Cell 502 standing outside looking around in a mixture of fear and concern as they realized that none of the walls that separated the cells were up. The group sat in silence, each person trying to figure out what was going on, until eventually a familiar face came running into view.

Neptune arrived in front of the group gasping and thoroughly out of breath. When he realized that over half of the residents of Cell 502 were just staring at him with confused looks on their faces he took a few calming breaths before saying, "a cleansing is going to happen tonight."

Ruby walked forward to stand in front of him. "What's a cleansing?" She asked loud enough that everyone could hear.

"A cleansing is an event," Neptune began. "They happen about once a month, either the first or last week of the month. So they can be back to back sometimes, but what happens is the people in charge don't put up the barriers in between cells. What's worse is that they open some kinda doors in the big walls that surround all of Relictus. This let's grimm in, and the security robots won't do anything to kill the grimm until morning. It's a fend for yourself situation right now and we have no way of knowing when they'll open the doors." Neptune didn't have to look at the group to know that they were upset. He had guided them around told them 'all they need to know' about Relictus, and yet he hadn't told them about cleansings until they were in the middle of one.

"And why didn't you tell us about this earlier," Weiss said angrily as she approached Neptune, apparently ready to hurt someone.

"Not important right now Weiss," Ruby said quickly. "We need people on the roofs looking for grimm. We can't afford to be caught off guard when they get here. I'll go on our roof since I have good night vision."

As Ruby finished her statement Blake, Velvet, and Sun all volunteered to stand as lookouts on the roofs of the various buildings. When that was finished and they were about to disperse the orange haired man by the name of Roman Torchwick raised his voice saying, "while it's all fine and dandy that we have lookouts and the like. What's the plan going to be when the grimm get here. I mean no matter what the lookouts do or say they will get here."

Ruby, who had started walking toward her assigned building, stopped and turned around to stare at Roman for a few seconds. "Pick a building, I don't care which one. Put everything that's even remotely important in that building. Bedding, any items that have personal value for whatever reason," she began while pulling out her knife and holding it out to Roman. "Then someone who's good at either unarmed combat, or fighting with a knife will guard the door. When the grimm get here you'll fight until you're tired and switch out with someone else who can take your place. Also we'll need some people to guard the windows, some of the small grimm can come in through those. We shouldn't have to worry about them breaking in through the walls as the only grimm that really do that are Goliaths."

Roman took the knife from the girl with red-tipped hair before nodding in acceptance of her plan and turning around to get the others to go to work. It wasn't all that hard for the group to choose a house, they all agreed that the closest - and easily most structurally sound one - would be the one they guarded. So they split up into three groups to try and grab everything important, which luckily for them wasn't all that much, and get it all to the designated building. Having completed their tasks everyone, other than the four lookouts, settled down and got ready for the shout that would tell them that the grimm were near.

The lookouts remained ever vigilant. Constantly signalling each other through very simple body language that they hadn't seen anything yet. The four had reached an agreement that they should remain silent. Hopefully their silence would allow more grimm to pass the cell before deciding to try and eat the few people there. They continued searching in silence for a little over half an hour before finally the call went out.

"Grimm incoming!" The blond monkey faunus, Sun Wukong, shouted from his rooftop. The other scouts didn't feel a need to verify his warning as all four of them jumped off of their respective rooftops and made their way to the 'safe' house. As they entered Roman stepped aside to allow them entry before taking his position in front of the doorway again.

"Okay so what's the guard rotation?" Ruby asked almost immediately upon entering the building.

"Roman first, Mercury second, Yang third, Yatsuhashi fourth, Neptune fifth, Pyrrha sixth, and Nora seventh before we restart," Weiss answered for the group.

"Add me onto the end of that," Sun said before Ruby could respond. "I'm good with unarmed combat."

"Noted," Weiss said while making a mental note. "Other than that Ren and Emerald are guarding the main window, while Jaune, Fox, and myself are guarding the other windows.

"I can help guard a window," Blake cut in, her amber eyes staring directly at Weiss.

"I can as well," Velvet added in directly after Blake.

"Alright," Weiss said slowly while thinking. "Velvet you help Fox, Blake you help Jaune, and Ruby since I know you'll volunteer you can help me."

Ruby nodded in acceptance of her assignment before looking around and realizing that two of the members of Cell 502 were missing. "Where are those other two? I think they're Nachton and Rezal?"

"They said something about being a distraction to give us more time before forcing Roman to let them leave," Coco said quietly.

Ruby winced slightly at that before looking questioningly at both Mercury and Emerald who had stood up and started walking toward the doorway.

"We'll go bring them back," Mercury stated matter-of-factly before the two pushed Roman to the side and bolted out of the doorway.

"Let them go," Ruby said before anyone else could react. "Coco you take Emerald's place at the window. We'll have to take Mercury off of the rotation until they come back… if they come back."

After that the group settled into silence as they prepared themselves for the night. Each person mentally preparing in their own unique way for the hell that would be the coming fight for their lives. Where any mistake, by anyone, could result in the loss of their life. The silence between group was somehow both comfortable and yet uncomfortable at the same time. Comfortable because they were each about to fight alongside each other and struggle to survive. Uncomfortable because it was highly likely that they were going to lose that struggle. Though no matter what happened, there were all grateful that they weren't fighting alone.

* * *

Two lone figures stood in the middle of an open plain, watching as a large group of grimm approached them. The two stood tall, neither caring about the fact that they were about to die, and neither showing fear at their imminent deaths.

"Hey Nachton," the tiger faunus said quietly. "You think it was a good idea to come out here?"

"Are you kidding Rezal?" The black-haired monkey faunus responded. "We're saving their lives right now. The longer we hold out here the less grimm actually get to them."

"While that's true… what about the grimm coming from other directions?"

"I guess we'll have to trust them to handle those."

As those words left left Nachton's mouth the grimm came upon them. The two stood their ground with wide, almost feral, grins on their faces as they fought. The former huntsmen never backed down as the flood of creatures continued on into the night and while they were not specialists in unarmed combat, the two were quite skilled in that art as well.

Nachton jumped around the grimm as he fought. His movements making him hard for the grimm to keep track of and his precise strikes always finding weak spots in the grimms armor. While he spent most of his time jumping around the grimm to avoid being hit, those few times he did strike back his fist broke through grimm armor and bone, leaving his target lifeless on the ground as it dissolved.

Rezal on the other hand stood his ground, striking out at every grimm that came his way. Unlike Nachton he didn't aim for weakspots, but rather he aimed to maim his targets, and his methods could be considered brutish. A beowolf came forward to challenge the tiger faunus, it's pitch black fur almost camouflaging it in the darkness of the night. Standing on its two hind legs it swung its left arm to claw at Rezal's face. Instead Rezal caught the beast's arm and then proceeded to tear the limb from the body to which it was attached.

The two continued to fight in their own unique styles as the night drew on. Unsurprisingly the first of the two to fall was Rezal. His body riddled with gashes from the claws of the grimm and tiring from blood loss he fell to his knees. At that moment a beowolf decided to bite into his shoulder, something that Rezal did not approve of. He punched the bipedal wolf-like creature repeatedly until eventually it's ribs collapsed on its heart, killing it. However he had lost too much blood, and died mere moments after his killer.

Nachton lasted an hour longer than his fellow huntsman. His evasive fighting style allowing him to avoid being harmed by anything more than just scratches. However he eventually tired and his movements became sloppy. He started getting scratched more and more until eventually they were no longer scratches but rather gashes. Not only that but his strikes were getting weaker, he was no longer able to kill the grimm he fought. So it was with a self-deprecating smile that the monkey faunus stopped fighting and closed his eyes. He didn't even notice when the massive bear-like beast known as an Ursa tore his head clean off his shoulders.

* * *

The group that stayed behind in the house were doing relatively well. No grimm had made it into the house and no one had been severely injured. They were mostly saved by the fact that the majority of the grimm saw fit to just walk past their house and those few that decided to kill the inhabitants were the weaker versions of grimm. Those that were guarding the door had fallen into a little bit of a routine. They had a circle that covered the majority of the living room, and whenever the person currently at the door called to switch they would all move over one spot. This made it so that they couldn't go out of order and everyone was able to get a decent amount of rest before being forced to go back to actively guarding again.

This routine continued for most of the night until Neptune was up to guard the door for the fourth time. Instead of calling out the word 'switch' he let out a pained scream as an ursa clawed at his torso. In response to his scream the others all rushed forward and, with a surprising amount of teamwork, pulled Neptune to safety while Yang and Roman fought off the ursa.

Mere moments later Ruby came into the room asking, "what happened?"

Pyrrha looked up from her position by Neptune's head, "He got hit by an ursa."

Ruby cursed softly to herself. "We were going so good too," she said to the others around her. "I'll take care of him. You guys go back to getting ready to guard the door. Pyrrha could you run up to Weiss real quick and let her know that I'll be down here for the rest of the night."

"Got it," Pyrrha said as she moved to do just that.

"Neptune," Ruby said as she kneeled next to the injured person. "You'll be okay. There can only be like an hour left until sunrise. At sunrise we'll be able to focus on first aid. For now though you'll have to deal with me helping you." As she said this to him she started taking off his shirt and then used it to cover the wound and apply pressure. It was deep, deep enough that she wasn't sure if he'd actually survive, but she needed to try and save him anyway.

"Ruby," Neptune croaked out softly in between labored breaths. "Don't save me. I put you and the others in danger."

"Neptune you'll die if you don't get help," the red-tipped brunette stated.

"Then kill me. I'm not going to make it anyway," Neptune said with as must finality as he could force into his voice before losing consciousness.

Looking around Ruby noticed that the knife wasn't currently in use and asked one of the others to grab it. When Nora come up and asked what was happening Ruby couldn't bear to look at the orange haired girl.

"Neptune wants to die. I… think I'm going to grant his wish," Ruby answered slowly. She was surprised when she felt a hand on her shoulder.

"If that's what he wants no one can blame you," the older girl said in what she hoped to be a comforting manner.

Ruby nodded slowly with tears forming in her eyes as she brought the knife down on the side of Neptune's head. She then put his shirt under his head and took the knife out before giving it to Nora to give to the next person who'd use it in the defense rotation. Ruby didn't know how long she sat there staring at Neptune, but what she did know is that when she finally looked up the sun was rising over the horizon and she could hear the gunfire of the guards killing of the remaining grim. She waited for another thirty minutes for the gunfire to end before leaving the building and climbing up to the roof and sitting down, relishing in the merciful silence that allowed her to process all that had happened in the last twelve hours.

 **A/N**

' **Sup guys. Shaded here, it's been a little bit since I've written something for this story. Hopefully you can see an improvement since my chapter in the prologue story (for those of you who've read the prologue story). Nyway Secret was originally supposed to write this chapter however stuff came up and unfortunately he couldn't so you got stuck with me. On the bright side, most of what I wrote for this chapter was inspired by his ideas for the chapter so I feel like this chapter is far better than it could have been if I was just told "go write stuff"**

 **Nyway have a good one everyone. Hope you enjoyed it. Also please leave a review telling us how we're doing and what you like or don't like about the story. Please do your best to be constructive with all criticisms though.**


	5. Sorry guys

**Hey guys. You may have realized that there have been no recent updates of Cell for about a month and I would like to explain why it will stay that way for a long time.**

 **When Division got together, we instantly went into brainstorming ideas for Cell and never actually used the time to get to know each other, much less our different writing styles. This really set us back and we really should have spent more time thinking than we did.**

 **We are still a group and talk quite often so that does leave a small chance that Cell may come back in the late, late future, but don't get your hopes up.**

 **I hope you all understand, and on that note I guess I'll see you all later, bye.**

 **-Snot and the rest of Division 502**


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